Daily Pulse India: ‘King of Good Times’ Heads to UK, Railway Minister Looks To the Future, Nano Troubles for TaMo

The future’s golden. In the minister Suresh Prabhu preferred to focus on an optimistic future, even as its finances this year worsened. He pitched for more investment in rail infrastructure and customer experience. Politically he played it safe, kept fares intact, and preferred to pin his bets on an economic turnaround. There was also room for startups, as Prabhu talked about concierge services, drones to monitor development projects and use of big data. There’s also a grant of 500 million rupees for startups hoping to work with the railways. There were no path-breaking announcements, just building on what’s already there. So, bet on the future, play it safe politically and economically, focus on the prime minister’s pet projects – is that going to be Arun Jaitley’s playbook too?

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No More Good Times: One of 2015’s most riveting boardroom battles has ended on a whimper. Vijay Mallya, the King of Good Times, has decided to resign from the board of United Spirits, and move to London. The spat between Diageo and Mallya began when Diageo took over the liquor company and discovered $200 million of loans passed around within the group. After threats of lawsuits flew on both sides of the battle, Diageo has agreed to pay Mallya $75 million to resign. His troubles are far from over, though. Mallya has been declared a willful defaulter by two of India’s biggest banks, to whom he owes $1 billion, which has sunk with his now defunct airline. This allows Mallya and Diageo to move ahead, but what about the banks?

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E-commerce hires and fires: A day after the news broke that Snapdeal has put 200 employees on an performance improvement plan, comes news of a bunch of high-level hires at Amazon with veterans from Citi, McKinsey and Swarovski coming on board, while Flipkart has said it plans to increase its tech team headcount by 50 percent. An amazing coincidence or just good PR?

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Anil Ambani’s Reliance Capital isn’t giving up on its plans to get a banking license. Two years ago, its application was turned down by RBI. At the time, there was a furor against corporate houses setting up banks, at a time when their finances were under investigation by various government agencies. Last year, when RBI handed out payment bank licenses, Reliance Industries, owned by Mukesh Ambani, made the list. Now the company plans to restructure its business completely to align better with RBI’s requirements, so that its next bid is successful.

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Workers at Tata Motors’ famous Sanand plant are up in arms. More than 400 workers, or 95 percent of the staff, at the Nano plant have struck work, protesting against the suspension of 28 workers for alleged indiscipline. The Sanand plant is a key part of the Tata Motor’s business as it makes the “world’s cheapest car,” which was erstwhile group chairman Ratan Tata’s dream. It’s also significant because the site of the plant, which was originally supposed to be in West Bengal and was caught up in land disputes with local farmers, was moved to Gujarat, when Tata was wooed by the then chief minister Narendra Modi – an example of his business friendly policies, which was amplified in the general elections and got him elected as Prime Minister.

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It was the go-to service till about five years ago. Justdial, the phone and SMS service to discover local merchants, has found itself sidelined by a host of niche startups that ate into its business such as Zomato and Practo. In an attempt to return to prominence, Justdial has launched an app for sellers, so it can combine the two, add a payment mechanism and turn into an e-commerce marketplace. It does have a deep database, which is a good start. For the rest, we’ll have to wait and watch.

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